Well protected under a pyramid of special glass from Glaverbel

Date: 12 February 2005
Source: Glaverbel

Date: 12 February 2005

The new home for Ulm's central library - an institution founded in 1516 - is proof that modern glass architecture can harmoniously blend into any surroundings without seeming out of place.

Construction of this attractive new building in Ulm's historical city centre was completed only recently. The building is located right next door to the historical town hall on the bustling marketplace, and it shows that, with the right planning, new and old can set each other off perfectly. The potentially shocking impact of such a large, imposing structure erected there using conventional building materials underlines just how important the choice of glass was as a material in its design.

The brief for this project was to not visually overpower the beautiful old town hall, but at the same time to preserve the character of the surrounding squares and narrow streets. The urban planning objective and aesthetic aim was to produce a solitaire on this conspicuous site that would meet the highest standards. A functional area of 3,600 m² was created to house approximately 220,000 media items. Ulm's central library provides an excellent solution to the problem of using the old without getting carried away with the new.

Construction and access
The building, erected over a frame construction, had a grid dimension of 6.6 m by 6.6 m. The glass skin covering the entire construction was designed as a double glass façade from the third storey upwards.
Access is gained via the main entrance on the east side of the building that opens onto the marketplace. The side entrance, which doubles as a staff entrance, can be reached on foot via the amphitheatre-style steps on the west side of the building.
Inside, a central staircase spirals around two lifts, providing access to the upper floors. A fire escape and a book lift complete the ensemble.

Vertically, the building is divided up into the ground floor, on the same level as the marketplace, a basement with workshops and a lecture room in the west wing, the library levels on the first, second and third floors, offices on the fourth floor, and a readers' café on the fifth floor, affording an exquisite view over the city.

Design of the façade
The building is entirely enclosed in a glass skin that exactly follows the shape of the building, which resembles two overhanging square stories topped with a glass pyramid. From the third floor upwards, the sloping glass is a double façade.
Ingenious measures ensure that a comfortable temperature can be maintained inside the building all year round without high energy costs. Indeed, the coating of Glaverbel's Sunergy solar control glass, combined with the outer layer of patterned glass, allows only a small amount of solar radiation to enter the building.

Moreover, the accessible double façade design acts as a useful climatic buffer. Large ventilation flaps and a moveable sunshade between the two skins of the façade prevent the building from overheating and protect against glare in sunny weather, as well as cooling the structural components with colder night air in order to avoid excessive cooling loads. The outer skin of Glaverbel glass is one of the key features of the building. The outer layer is made of laminated safety glass comprising:
- an outer sheet of 10-mm toughened screen printed glass (colour: RAL 7040 window grey);
- a 1.52-mm PVB film interlayer;
- an 8-mm inner sheet of Sunergy Azur solar control glass coated in position four.

The outer sheet is fitted flush with the façade between the vertical supports via cut-out sections measuring 4 x 18 mm (see figure.). Horizontally, the sheets were sealed with high-quality silicon. The 3,500 m² of special glass used in the pyramid guarantee safety, residual load-bearing capacity in the event of breakage, solar control, an aesthetic appearance and a high level of transparency. The optimally successful glass construction won the Wings of Glass Award in the category of Most Original Building Structure (old – new).

The library's construction called for a solar control glass with low external reflection (7%) that would blend in with its historical setting. In addition, it had to be possible to toughen and laminate the glass, which had to have high light transmission (50%) and a low solar factor (38%, value for non-screen-printed glass).

The product selected was Sunergy, the only solar control glass on the market with a hard pyrolytic coating, a low level of light reflection and a neutral appearance. Other pyrolytic coatings were unsuitable because their external reflection was too high. Soft coatings could not be used either, because they couldn't subsequently be toughened or laminated.

All requirements were fully met by Glaverbel's glasses, produced in cooperation with BGT in Bretten, which did an excellent job of the screen printing, toughening and lamination processes.

600450 Well protected under a pyramid of special glass from Glaverbel glassonweb.com

See more news about:

Others also read

Emirates Glass, a Dubai Investment subsidiary, has won a major contract to supply 140,000 square meters of its premium glass to the prestigious development on the Palm Jumeirah, reaffirming its already established reputation as the single most prominent company in the entire regional glass industry.The deal was announced during the company's participation in the prestigious Big 5 show, the largest annual venue for the entire Middle-East glass contracting industry.
Isra Vision Systems AG supplier of machine vision systems, has successfully improved its market position in display glass inspection with a major order totalling 1.8 Mio Euro.
Packagers such as the UK's Rexam and private equity firms are set to vie for pump-sprayer business Calmar, which France's Saint-Gobain (SGOB.
The National Lime & Stone Co. will discontinue production of calcined lime early next month at its Carey plant, the company CEO announced Thursday.
Jain Scientific Glass Works, manufacturers of glassware for laboratories, is importing glass as raw material from China, which was much cheaper than the local product and abundantly available.
Japan 1 2 1 S. Korea 6 6 3 Southern Taiwan 4 2 0 Central Taiwan 0 4 2 AGC Japan 0 1 1 Taiwan (Yunlin) 1 1 1 Source: PIDA (Photonic Industry & Technology Development Association) Taiwan TFT-LCD Panel Makers Happy to See Substrate-price Falls in 2006 Taipei, Dec. 27, 2005 (CENS)--Both of the world's top-two glass-substrate makers are actively expanding their production capacity in Taiwan, which is expected to cut substrate transportation time and cost for local thin film transistor-liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD) panel makers and boost production efficiency, according to Michael Wang, project manager and senior analyst of Taiwan's PIDA (Photonic Industry & Technology Development Association).According to Wang, Asahi Glass Co. (AGC) of Japan has solved problems in lowering the defect-free rate for the production of fifth- and sixth-generation (5G, 6G) glass substrates, and is expected to tap the market with products with higher price competitiveness in 2006 to grab more market share in the 6G substrate businessIn addition, Wang added, the aggressive capacity added by both Corning of the U.S., the world's No. 1 substrate supplier, and AGC, the No. 2, will lead to price drops for glass substrates and will especially benefit TV panel makers such as AU Optronics Corp. (AUO) and Chi Mei Optoelectronics Corp. (CMO) in TaiwanCurrently, Wang pointed out, a 6G substrate is priced at about 27,000 to 30,000 Japanese yen, about 1,000 to 2,000 yen lower than in the third quarter of 2005.

Add new comment